When an American Airlines flight hit several birds on takeoff recently at Seattle-Tacoma International Airport, creating a dent in the aircraft's nose, passengers may have been alarmed. But for pilots, handling bird strikes is standard procedure.

"[Passengers] think a bird strike brings an airplane down," says Jim Colburn, a pilot and director of flight operations at Frontier Airlines. "It's simply not true. You would be amazed what these airplanes can do."

Here's the reality: American's April 27 incident was, in most respects, no big deal. The airline reports that Flight 2310 from Seattle to Dallas/Fort Worth sustained damage to its radome, which protects the aircraft's weather radar system. An American spokesman says it is typical for aircraft to return to the airport after a bird strike, but in this case, the plane did not rush back, taking time to dump fuel before landing. "There was no performance issue at all with the Airbus A321," American's Ross Feinstein tells Condé Nast Traveler. The plane was fixed the next day.

"Bird strikes are an uncommon but known reality of running a global airline," Delta spokesman Morgan Durrant says. "Aircraft and engine design can withstand these events with enough integrity to allow flight crews to execute a return to the field or an emergency landing."

Pilots generally encounter birds below 5,000 feet, either shortly after takeoff or before landing, Colburn says. And while strikes may not be common, they're not all that rare, either. Perry Cooper, a spokesman for Seattle's airport, says that in a typical year, airlines report about 180 strikes to airport officials, though only about one-third of them are believed to have occurred in Seattle. (The rest typically happen elsewhere, but are discovered in Seattle.) Cooper says about 95 percent cause no damage.

In some cases, pilots don't even know it happened. Colburn remembers preparing for a landing in a blizzard in Bismarck, North Dakota, when he heard something that sounded like a suitcase dropping in the cabin. He and his copilot landed, taxied to the gate, and inspected the airplane's radome. "It was covered in blood and bird feathers," he says. This is part of the reason pilots look over their aircraft on the ground. Says Colburn: "I have taken a bird in the engine and never knew it until I smelled it."

Ingesting a bird into an engine is more concerning, but even then, pilots are prepared. In simulators, pilots practice what to do if, say, a plane loses an engine on takeoff. Losing two engines is much greater problem, but despite one notable incident—US Airways Flight 1549, which in January 2009 landed in New York City's Hudson River after ingesting birds in both engines after takeoff—this is not a scenario pilots expect to face. Most consider it a freak occurrence.

Usually, Colburn says bird strikes are more of an annoyance than a major safety concern. "You go out and clean it up and maintenance does an inspection on it and you go on. Even if [a bird] goes into the engine, most of the time, it's no big deal."